Flawed
by MelodyPond77
Summary: Albus said I would never die because I was too mean for Heaven and too annoying for even the Devil to stand me, and so Earth would be stuck with my terrorizing ways for all eternity. For Lizziebee.


**Hogwarts One-Shot Wars**

The Inquisitorial Squad

Lieutenant

(secondary character: Muriel. Plot point: One character dies (Dumbledore) and the other deals with his loss).

 **WC: 1,206**

Also for History of Magic on Hogwarts Forum - Write about an irreversible damage (Dumbledore dying is pretty irreversible).

 _For Lizziebee, who inspired the parentheses that kept shoving their way into this story._

* * *

We always joked that neither of us would ever die.

Albus said I would never die because I was too mean for Heaven and too annoying for even the Devil to stand me, and so Earth would be stuck with my terrorizing ways for all eternity.

I always told him that he was Albus Dumbledore, and he wouldn't die because frankly, Death would be too scared to come for him.

It was a running joke with us, said so often I almost believed it was true.

(But I never did).

We met at Hogwarts, when I was a eleven and he was a thirteen, and I was sorted into Gryffindor. He smiled at me, Elphias Dodge said I was a cute little thing, and I shoved some hash into his face.

Albus still loved to laugh over that event, even when we were over a hundred.

(I never found it as funny as he did).

When I was twelve and he was fourteen, people thought it odd that a spoiled, stuck-up little pureblood Gryffindor, hated more than any Slytherin by the entire school, could be such close friends with Albus Dumbledore, champion of underdogs and most brilliant mind in the entire school, possibly in his entire generation. People talked of how I had blackmailed him, ensnared him in a love potion, or seduced him in some other way, because how else could he stand me, if not blinded by love?

(He _was_ blinded by love, but not by the kind they thought it was).

When I was thirteen and he was fifteen, he was the only boy who understood my confusion, my pain, and my need to force it deep inside where I couldn't find it, and force everyone else away so they couldn't find it either.

(He found it anyways).

When I was fourteen and he was sixteen, I was the only one he trusted with his secret, and even then, only because I walked into his dorm room and caught him. I'd always known he liked Elphias far too much. They begged me not to tell and I said yes because Albus was a brother to me, and I couldn't lose that.

(I knew one day I would).

When I was fifteen and he was seventeen, we stayed in touch when he graduated, and I stayed with my aunt in Godric's Hollow, right down the street, and visited Albus every day and never said a word. I watched as he'd stumble out of bed in the mornings, freshly shagged and spouting nonsense about living forever and becoming invincible and letting the world know how powerful he really was.

(Suddenly our joke was entirely too real).

When I was fifteen and he had just turned eighteen, I watched as he shouted and pushed and told me never to say the words 'Elphias' or 'Doge' or 'love' again, and to leave him alone to become great.

(I had never said those words in the first place).

I was there when he turned fifty-seven and I was fifty-five and he cried into my shoulder as he allowed the Aurors to cart off his dreams, and then I sent him back to Hogwarts where he belonged with a sigh and a push and a gentle kiss on the cheek. He laughed and told me not to be so nice, or Heaven would surely change it's mind and take me anyways. I told him not to be a blubbering mess, or Death wouldn't be so scared of him and pay him a visit in the middle of the night.

(Old jokes aren't nearly as comforting when you're one third of the way closer to conquering

Death, though).

When I was eighty and he was eighty-two I told him "I told you so" and opened my house for his Order. I cleaned my mansion and scolded the young men and ignored the curious glances of the few women present as they searched for a ring on my finger and a husband in my family portraits. They giggled whenever Albus and I were in the same room and sat shocked when the great wizard himself meekly took his elbows off my table. They cast eyes at their young men and wished I would do the same to my not-so-young man.

(But men were far from the objects I wished to cast eyes at).

When I was ninety-one and he was ninety-three, he came and told me of the death of the girl with brilliant green eyes who'd never cast eyes at her man and had uncovered my secret with one glance from her illuminated gaze, and he cried at the boy who was both the savior and downfall of the one dark wizard who was darker than most. He told me of the boy with the lightning scar, the boy who lived, the boy who must die, the boy he must kill, and worried how he would ever survive seeing a boy so young die, knowing he could have stopped it but didn't.

(One look at his fragility showed me he wouldn't have to bear that pain).

When I was one hundred and three and he was one hundred and five he came and told me that my only great niece was locked in a chamber deep under the ground by the memory of the thing he had tried so hard to defeat, and he held me as I screamed and I cried and never said a word of my weakness to anyone. He nodded and comforted and told me the Great

Harry Potter would get her out, and then my family wouldn't be at risk anymore.

(He and I both knew they would always be at risk, they always had been at risk).

When I was one hundred and seven and he was one hundred and nine, he joked that the ring couldn't kill him and that he would find the necklace and add it to his jewelry collection, and when all was done and the ring safe once more he would bring her back and properly introduce me to the little girl he'd tried so hard to forget but would always remember. He promised me he would return to Hogwarts safe and would see me in the summer.

(He did keep his promise, but not in the ways he had hoped. I only saw him that summer when I went to his funeral and barely refrained from murdering the pompous little minister)

And when I was one hundred and seven and Albus wasn't anymore, I sat at my great nephew's wedding and glared as lies spewed from Elphias Doge's mouth and prayed that someone would remember that Albus was human and Albus was weak and Albus was power-hungry and Albus was understood and Albus was mine.

(But though Rita Skeeter saw his flaws, she never saw how strong they made him).

We always joked that neither of us would ever die.

(But we both knew that one of us would, and that the other's heart would die with them).


End file.
